When running BOINC I noticed my computer froze one or two times and it did not appear to be software related. Being curious I surfed around and found some software that monitors CPU temp and fan speed. Upon running it right away it had my CPU temp in the "too hot" category.

It was running at 100% I would guess for about 30 hours on BOINC. The temperature for the CPU was 61º C. I am not too educated on cooling but that sounds a bit high for me. I would like to know if anyone else has any suggestions or has had the same problem.

I would suggest anyone that is wondering about overheating to look into it.
I run a P4 2.6 GHz HT
The software I used to get the CPU Temp and monitor it for a while was: Speed Fan

The website is:
http://www.almico.com/speedfan.php

And the download for the software is:
http://www.almico.com/speedfan413.exe

I would really like to know if I am doing permanent damage to my CPU or is it safe. I from what I have researched so far it would be ok for a CPU to run at 60º C for gaming but for a computer to be left on 24/7 is it safe or do I need to upgrade my cooling system and if so what should I do.

Any suggestions comments or help would be much appreciated.

I currently have completely suspended my use of BOINC until I have been satisfied that I am not damaging anything on my computer.

-jjhat1

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EDIT – July 4 2004 2:00 PM EST

I decided to experiments some and took off the side of the case. The resulting temperature when running BOINC was still in the mid 50s so I decided to try something else. I took a very small room fan and placed it near the computer. And pointed it so the the air from it will help circulate the air through my case. This worked to get the CPU temp down to 47 – 49 degrees C. I assume that this is an acceptable running temp although it is high for the numbers I have looked at for full throttle for the P4. I probably will leave my system like this until I find a more practical solution.

I also have this problem. I use an Intel D875PBZ motherboard with an Intel P4 processor at 3 GHz. My system info shows that I have one fan and the problem is located in system zone 1, not the processor zone

For a 2.4GHZ, the maximum temperature should be in the range of 70°C.
If your CPU goes in the range of 60°C and above when running at high load, one of the things you can do first is looking if you have any dust on the heatsink. If a lot of dust is present, this can higher the temperature by a lot of degrees.
Another good approach is using thermal cooling compound between heatsink and CPU.
What is helping also is using an extra fan in order to blow fresh air inside the case and get the warm air out of the case.
Another improvement can be changing the CPU cooler as there is a lot of difference in the performance comparing one cooler against another.

although CPU's can get as high as 70, the cooler it is, the better... you should get more case fans to help cool off your CPU. I have been running seti 24/7 for 4 years now. My cpu is at 43 degrees. this is an upper limit of where I allow it... I would never install water cooling in my computer ( one leak and bye bye computer)